Lundigan center move looks iffy

The Burbank City Council is doing a public disservice by pulling millions in redevelopment money over to the city’s coffers under the auspice of funding the proposed Lundigan Community Center.

Clearly, the council isn’t even sold on the project, and let’s not forget that the center wouldn’t even be within a redevelopment zone — a fact not lost on former Mayor Anja Reinke when she absolved herself of the sham fund transfer.

In abstaining from the narrow vote, Reinke called the move to transfer $5.2 million in redevelopment money earmarked for youth services “a little BS-y to me.”

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Her colleague, Gary Bric, even acknowledged that the fund transfer — another apparent attempt to protect local money from possible raids by Sacramento lawmakers seeking to bridge a multibillion-dollar deficit — didn’t necessarily mean the city would spend it on the Lundigan Community Center.

The City Council had no problem calling an earlier transfer of millions in redevelopment money more what it was: a unabashed shell game to hide redevelopment revenues from Sacramento. To tag this most recent transfer to a proposed community center sets up unfair expectations from the public.